Mantra
by Eden Lies
Summary: Touga Yagari is selfish. He repeats a single sentence over and over in his head like a mantra. And this mantra, much more than any missing eye, is what makes him blind. Oneshot, light YagarixZero.


Hey guys, this is my first Vampire Knight fanfic ^-^. I have always found the relationship between Touga and Zero to be very interesting; and to me, it seems direly unexplored. We see that there's something of importance between them with the whole issue of Yagari losing his eye to save Zero, so I thought it would be interesting if I tried to write a piece focused on them. This could be taken as a purely platonic Yagari/Zero, but I actually meant for this to be a more romantic relationship.

Rating: K+

Warnings: None, really.

Disclaimer: I do not own the characters, and some of the sentences I've used throughout are actually taken from a volume of the manga.

Enjoy!

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**Mantra**

**

* * *

**"Why do you have all of the windows closed?"

The room is dark, tense, and silent. Trained ears (only attained through years and years of work) pick up on the sound of unsteady breathing. Touga Yagari's eye hones in on the relatively still form of his student, sitting slouched against the wall. This isn't the same boy he had loved. This is someone unrecognizable.

Boots clack as the vampire hunter makes his way to the curtains. He reaches to pull the curtains back, to rip them off their hinges- but something holds him back.

Poised, tense, as if expecting something, Touga spits out another question.

"How is your right shoulder?"

A snap sounds as he unlocks his gun and aims it point-blank at his student's head. In his mind he hears an even louder snap; that of his heart breaking into a million pieces. He envisions bloody fragments of his heart as bullets because his student (the boy he loved) was long gone and his heart wasn't made for anyone else, anyways.

* * *

Touga Yagari is selfish.

He repeats a single sentence over and over in his head like a mantra.

'He can learn from no other but me.'

And this mantra, much more than any missing eye, is what makes him blind.

* * *

_"Zero," said a young man to a tiny little boy, "This is your first lesson."_

_ They were in the clearing of a pretty, springtime forest. The man was holding a tiny clay pot and a shovel, and the little boy was holding nothing at all. It was late afternoon. Sunlight glinted off of birds' feathers and flower petals, and a million leaves rustled in the wind simultaneously, creating a constant, low murmuring. After a moment of looking around, the young man knelt in front of a particularly lush patch of wildflowers. _

_ "You see these flowers?" he said, and Zero nodded. "This is what everyone wants to have and wants to be."_

_ The little boy's eyes lit up. "I've seen these flowers before," he exclaimed, "Father gave them to mother once, and mother seemed really happy to get them. She said something about it being a good scent-i-mint."_

_ The man nodded and chuckled lightly as he got up off the ground._

_ "Yes, Zero, it's important because of its sentimental value. But things like this," Touga said, pointing to a tiny, wilted stalk of green, "are just as important."_

_ "What, that weed?" said the siver-haired boy, pulling a face. "I don't think mother would be too happy to get a bouquet of those. We should just dig up a bunch of those pretty flowers and bring them home."_

_ Touga silently dug the pitiful little plant out of the ground, placed it inside the clay pot, and packed in dirt to cover its roots. The little boy frowned. _

_ "Take this home," said the young man, "and hold onto it. You'll see if you take care of it, it'll become even more beautiful than that entire patch of wildflowers."_

_ "Nuh-uh," said the boy, "I don't want it! Mother said she wanted some nice flowers, not weeds like this thing." _

_ Touga looked at the little boy sternly as he held out the pot. _

_ "Now listen," he said, "You need to learn how to hold on to things, and how to take care of things, whether you like it or not. You'll only ever be able to take care of yourself if you learn how to care for others first."_

_ Zero rolled his eyes as he reached out his hands to grab the plant. _

_ "Fine, old man, I'll take home the weed. But you'll see, it'll never grow into anything pretty!"_

_

* * *

_The vampire hunter cannot bring himself to shoot, and his student's complete and utter silence unnerves him. So he talks instead. He finds talking is a good way to distract himself.

"Even though that bullet didn't hit you, a vampire gun can do great damage. Although vampires heal quickly, it will still take quite some time. That is, unless they drink the blood of a living person."

But even as his words spew venom, the gun trembles a little and he knows that he was never actually considering pulling the trigger in the first place.

Irrationally, Touga itches to open the curtains.

* * *

Zero's lilac eyes finally look up to meet Touga Yagari's single one.

* * *

"_You were right, Yagari-san! Look at how pretty the weed became! It's almost like it bloomed overnight, when I finally decided to take care of it."_

_

* * *

_

For some, there is a moment of such overwhelming intensity (greater than life, death, and everything in-between) that is burned into their memory forever. For Touga Yagari, that moment is now. His gun is immobile, and his student's eyes are burning into him, communicating every lost thought, memory, or wish that would never come to be.

His first lesson should have been on the topic of letting go. Because somehow, from the moment he first met Zero, he had known that the boy would never truly be his.

And this moment he is living in, this dark-room he is standing in, this lilac gaze he is staring into, are all imprinted into his memory like an embossed photograph.

* * *

_He disliked visiting the Cross household. Not because he did not wish to see Zero, and not only because Kaein annoyed him, but because he was beginning to see something spark between the young boy and his new 'sister', Yuki. _

_ Sometimes, while they were having dinner, he would catch Yuki sending Zero a doe-eyed stare, and sometimes, he would see her blush. It took all of his internal willpower to not roll his eyes or to not jump up and pull Zero out of her gaze's direction. _

_ But worse yet to the vampire hunter was that it seemed Zero shyly returned her affection. If she was crying, he would try his best to comfort her, and if she was scared, he would offer to let her hold his hand. As he watched them hug, or watched them go play games together, he couldn't help but to feel jealous of Yuki. _

_ She had much more of an excuse to hold Zero's hand, much more of an excuse to touch him, much more of an excuse to love him. She was around his age and she was a pretty girl, and life always seemed to tilt in favor of couples that matched perfectly, and of couples that everyone liked and society approved of. _

_ But what he hated the most (that he managed to realize) was that she was an important agent in getting his student to grow for the better. In the days directly after his family was murdered, he had gone completely mute and moved through necessary daily activities as if he were a doll. No matter what Touga had tried, he never managed to get a response from him. Not one. But after only weeks living in the Cross household and meeting Yuki, Zero had already begun his slow transformation back into who he had been before. _

_ Touga Yagari hated the fact that Yuki had been the one with the power to do that. _

_ And Touga Yagari hated the fact that he had to share his Zero with someone else._

_ One day, Touga was staying over at the Cross household for the night. He had come in from a particularly fierce and stamina-draining mission the night before, and since his friend Kaein's home was closer to where he was than his own, he had quickly stumbled his way there. _

_ It must have been around two in the morning when he heard screams and thrashing sounding from what could only be Zero's bedroom. He had thrown off the covers of his makeshift bed on the couch of the living room, hastily dragged on the pair of pants he had been wearing during his mission, and ran through the halls of the house, searching for his student's room. When he reached Zero's bedroom, he promptly realized that he had not been the first to do so. The door of his room was already slightly ajar, and through the crack, he could see Yuki hugging the boy, whispering comforting words to him. Zero's screams began to quiet down as his nightmares disappeared, and he gradually fell into a more peaceful sleep in the arms of the girl. _

_ For minutes upon minutes after the screaming subsided, Touga had just stood outside of the door, watching. And something he saw occur in these minutes snapped the final thread within him. Yuki had reached down to place a tender kiss on Zero's forehead. It shouldn't have bothered him, the kiss, especially because it was so light that it was almost nothing. In fact, he knew it likely had little romantic sentiment behind it. But something huge, something burning, something putridly green, roared inside of him. It tore him apart from the inside as he forced his head to turn away from the scene. _

_ He stayed away from the Cross household after that._

_

* * *

_In his mind, Touga repeats his mantra.

'He can learn from no other but me.'

But somehow, he no longer believes himself. There are cracks starting to shine through his logic.

* * *

The door swings open violently and light suddenly fills the room as Yuki rushes in to find Touga Yagari aiming his gun at Zero's forehead.

Both men in the room break their concentration with one another to stare at the intruder.

"No, stop!" She shouts desperately, honestly believing that the vampire hunter will pull the trigger any second. And the instant that Zero realizes its her, Touga can see something rapidly change within him. Zero reaches up and grabs the barrel of the gun, forces it away roughly.

_She's like a catalyst_, Touga thinks dazedly as he watches Yuki rush to embrace the shaken young vampire. He takes uneven steps backwards from Zero and the girl, until he is almost at the room's doorway.

_She's everything I was never able to be._

_ She's taught him everything about life I was never able to teach him._

And as he watches Yuki reach forward and open the curtains without hesitation, he realizes that there are many different forms of knowledge.

* * *

Touga has a new mantra.

'He will never be mine.'

He repeats this mantra to himself as he watches Zero and Yuki through the room's now open window.

He can blind himself with his ignorance no longer.

* * *

"_Love is not blind; it is an extra eye, which shows us what is most worthy of regard."_

_- James Matthew Barrie_

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Well, that's the end of it :D. How was it? If it was confusing at all, please don't hesitate to tell me, or ask me about it. I would greatly appreciate reviews~_  
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